The Abyss Staring Back
by prouvaires
Summary: The night they tore down gods. -—hugo/roxanne


**notes**: this is primarily for The Cousincest Competition on HPFC (I need to get back into that place) with the pairing HugoRoxanne and the lyric _"We were the kings and queens of promise; we were the victims of ourselves. Maybe the children of a lesser God, between Heaven and Hell." __from Kings and Queens by 30 Seconds to Mars; however I'm also using it for the first of my 10 Fandoms Challenge._

* * *

The Abyss Staring Back

_how can you say to me i am a king? -__—Richard II, 3.2_

* * *

When they stand for the end of the world, her fingers are strong but shaking inside his, her skin darker than ever with all the Earth in shards around them.

At the bowing of the godhead, her silhouette breaks into a queen.

x

Back eight days and four more hours and their lives are running away from them. Her hands in his hair, his under her clothes, and the sin is lost beneath the weight of lust. He drowns her, softly and sweetly, and when she breathes out smoke curls from her lips.

"Indifference," he presses to her collarbone, tongue chasing the word and printing it there.

"Theism," she rejoins, and swallows a sigh before whispering, "You have to believe in gods to throw them down."

x

A year more in the past and they do not touch. They do not stick truths to each other's skin. Instead they sit on a rooftop somewhere in Rome and watch the sky and promise, silently and then to each other, that the time is coming.

Revolution always sat well in their bones.

x

A day after the end of all things and he is not sure where they stand now.

But he catches her eye across a blackened room, and the answer presents itself without effort.

Beside each other. Of course.

x

The night before and Heaven and Hell are pressing too close for comfort. They are wrapped around each other like the strength of them will keep an apocalypse apart but he doesn't think either of them believe it.

Maybe she does, actually. She has always believed in the things he has attempted not to.

x

Two years and six months previous to that, her mother finds them in the woods behind her house. She is out walking, they are burning each other's bones, and her scream could slay dragons.

Being forced apart publicly cements them together in secret, bound to each other and the unspoken ambition sat in each corner of their eyes. He slips into her room that night after they've been banned from seeing each other, and they rock each other to sleep with quiet promises.

"We'll be kings and queens, from here to forever."

Their phantom crowns rest heavy on their heads the whole of that night.

x

The first hour of it all and she is bloody and bruised, and he is worse, but their mouths find each other in the midst of it all and with the whole battered world behind them they raise swords and wands and charge. Head first, as with all things.

x

A year afterwards and the crown has turned out to suit her far better than him. Queens always make better rulers than kings anyhow. History will not stop emphasising this fact.

x

Five years and she has victory and strength tattooed on her brow but she looks too much like his sister and in the end it's far too much for him to bear.

"We threw too much away," he weaves against her jaw that night, "We tore it all down and we should have left some standing."

In the darkness, she says nothing at all.

x

Another year and he joins the perished gods in exile. Thrones are lonely places, he's discovered, and he'd rather be a beloved nothing than a frozen king.

She stays.

She could not rip the crown from her head if she tore with all her might.

"Pride," he accuses as he stands before her, shame out loud for all to see.

"Strength," she retorts, and he doesn't need to contradict her for her to know she lies.

x

Eight more months and he finds her in the middle of the night, smoke in her veins and poison in all her angles.

"I can never go back," she responds to the request he never makes. "It's too late. Too much. Too far."

He sets her crown aside to claim her for the night regardless. Too far always was their trademark.

x

In the end, falling suits him far more than flying.


End file.
